by Brenda Novak
The next few pictures were of Grandpa and the baby. Caleb held the book closer as he examined Ellis Purcell. What could Ellis have been thinking as he looked at his wife, daughter and brand-new granddaughter? Was he feeling any remorse for the women he’d murdered so brutally? Or was his mind a million miles away, anticipating his next victim?
If so, Purcell had outsmarted them all.
Or maybe he hadn’t outsmarted anybody. Maybe they’d set their sights on the wrong guy from the beginning. Gibbons was becoming more and more suspicious of Johnny. He thought Johnny might’ve picked up where his father had left off. Who else would have access to Purcell’s truck? Gibbons had argued. Who else would have known exactly how to position the body except someone with inside information?
Caleb couldn’t answer those questions. But he wasn’t convinced that Johnny was their man. In Caleb’s mind, Johnny didn’t have the nerve to do what this killer did. This killer was cool and cunning, far more controlled than Johnny. Stealing a car was one thing. Sexually assaulting and strangling a woman was another. That kind of brutality took a deep-seated rage….
“She’s finally asleep,” Madison said, emerging from the hall.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Caleb said, indicating the photo album. “It was on the table.”
She frowned slightly but crossed the room and sat on the sofa a few feet away from him, wearing the same jeans and tight-fitting T-shirt she’d had on when he arrived. “Brianna dragged it out.”
“I take it this is your ex,” he said, turning back to the picture of Danny on the front page.
She made a face and scooted closer to look. “Handsome devil, isn’t he?”
Caleb smiled at her sarcasm. “I’m guessing he must’ve had other attributes.”
“Not really.”
He raised his brows in question.
“I’ve decided he was an escape,” she said. “An escape from everything that was going on in my life at the time. I didn’t realize it when I married him, of course. But I had to face the truth shortly after. Especially because my marriage didn’t really change anything, at least not for the better.”
“You mean you couldn’t get along with a guy who frowns at the birth of his own daughter?” he asked with feigned surprise.
Madison laughed. “That passes as a smile for Danny.”
“How did such a love match unravel?”
“We weren’t ever what you could call a ‘love match.’ Danny’s persistence and his confidence that we were meant to be together finally won me over. He was five years older and had his life all neatly planned out. He was also pretty understanding about the investigation—at first. And I’d just lost my best friend, so I was particularly vulnerable.”
She brought her legs up and wrapped her arms around them. “Most of all, I was longing to settle down, have a family of my own and live what I hoped would be a ‘normal’ life. He claimed he wanted those things, too.”
Caleb still couldn’t believe Danny had managed to get a woman like Madison to even look at him. “What changed after you were married?”
“Danny was a lot more complex and difficult than I’d ever expected. Emotionally, he was like a child—everything revolved around him. He could never see how what was happening with my father affected me, only how it affected him. And after the first few years, two more bodies were discovered and the investigation intensified, so he stopped being as understanding.”
“How long were you married?”
“Seven years.” She drew an audible breath. “But we had detectives following us around toward the end. So that probably made a big difference to his behavior.”
Caleb got up to pour himself some more wine. “You knew the police were following you?”
“Sometimes the detectives would sit at the curb out front and wave to us as we went in and out. I think they were trying to intimidate us.”
That must have been after Caleb quit the force, because he’d never seen Danny in person. Gibbons had always kept him busy taking care of the hundreds of peripheral people who had to be interviewed. “Did it work?” he called from the kitchen.
“It was intimidating, sure,” she said. “It would be intimidating for anyone. But I don’t think they were very smart to bully us.”
“Why?”
She accepted the glass of wine he brought back for her. “Their tactics only made me more determined to remain firm. Not that it did me any good. When the killings started up again, the police felt so much pressure to solve the case, they transferred that pressure to us, including Danny. Pretty soon the neighbors were accustomed to seeing detectives coming and going from my house, but they certainly weren’t happy about it.”
She paused to take a sip of wine. “They formed their own opinions,” she continued, “and hinted that if I’d only cooperate and ‘do the right thing’ it would all be over and my ‘poor husband’ could hold up his head again. They quit inviting us to neighborhood barbecue parties. They wouldn’t let their children play with Brianna or come to our house.” She sighed and shifted position so she could stretch her legs out in front of her. “Danny couldn’t tolerate all the negative attention.”
“Why didn’t the two of you take your baby and move somewhere else? Somewhere the murders and the investigation weren’t so publicized?” Caleb asked, thinking that if he were Danny, he would’ve done anything to protect his family.
“By the time we realized things weren’t going to die down, Danny had landed a fantastic job at Waskell, Bolchevik and Piedmont. You’ve probably heard of them.”
“The big engineering firm downtown?”
She nodded. “He wasn’t willing to walk away from that. His job came before everything.”
“Does he have other family in town?”
“His parents and one brother live in Spokane, so they’re not far.”
Caleb held his glass up to the light, studying the pale gold of the chardonnay. “What about you?”
“What about me?”
“Didn’t you want to leave Seattle?”
“No, leaving was never an option. I’m my mother’s only child. I had to stay here and support her and my father.”
He crossed his feet at the ankles, finally beginning to relax and distance himself from the reality of what had happened to Susan, and her funeral, and the whole past week. “What about your parents? Didn’t they ever consider moving?” he asked.
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Toward the end, they were convinced the police would plant some sort of evidence if one of the detectives ever gained access to the house.”
Caleb pictured Madison with a young baby, a bad marriage, a needy mother, a murder suspect for a father, and Gibbons and Thomas always at her heels, invading her privacy.
“I admire you for standing by your parents,” he said, and was surprised by the fact that he actually meant it. At one time he’d thought her callous and irresponsible for refusing to cooperate with the police. But now that he understood her situation better, he could see exactly why she’d done what she had. Few women were as loyal as Madison Lieberman. She’d even hung on to Danny for seven years.
“I did what I thought was best,” she said. “But now…”
Caleb finished the last of his wine and slid down so he could rest his head on the back of the couch. “But now?”
“Now I think I might have made a huge mistake.”
“How so?” He glanced over at her, noting her grave expression.
“Can I trust you, Caleb?”
“Trust me?” he repeated, feeling numb. Sure, you can trust me was a little too blatant a lie, even if he told it for the right reasons. “That depends on what you’re going to trust me with,” he said, hedging.
She placed her hand on his forearm and let it slip down. Unable to resist, he turned his hand palm up when she reached it, lacing his fingers securely through hers.
She looked down at their entwined hands, and he could tell that, like his
, her breathing had gone a little shallow.
“Sometimes I wish I’d never been born to Ellis Purcell,” she said.
Mesmerized by the contact, by the delicacy of her slim fingers, Caleb was feeling a very powerful physical response. It didn’t help that it was late, they were alone…and the last thing he wanted was to return to an empty house to brood about Susan.
On impulse, he lifted her hand to his mouth and brushed a kiss across her knuckles. “I thought you said he didn’t do it.”
She shivered as though a tingle had traveled through her body—through places he wished he could touch.
“I said I didn’t think he did it.” She swallowed visibly, her eyes on his mouth as he rubbed his lips lightly across the back of her hand. “But I didn’t know then what I know now.”
What was she saying? He’d been so preoccupied with touching her that he hadn’t been paying as much attention to her words as he should. Letting go, he sat up. “You want to run that by me one more time?”
She seemed a little startled by his abrupt change. “Nothing. It’s the wine, that’s all,” she said, grabbing her wineglass. “I don’t know what I’m saying.”
“Madison?”
“What?”
“You said you didn’t know then what you know now. What did you mean by that?”
She put the photo album on the coffee table. “Never mind. My heart still tells me there’s no way my father could have hurt those women.”
“But can you always trust your heart?” he murmured, cupping her chin so she had to look up at him.
She lowered her lashes, and he sensed that she was feeling the same attraction he was.
“I don’t know,” she said, “but I think everyone comes face-to-face with that question at least once in a lifetime. Don’t you?”
Caleb was pretty sure he was coming face to face with it now. His heart was telling him to protect Madison, to let himself care about her. But his head was telling him he’d been right all along. She knew something she wasn’t saying.
And for Susan, and Holly, and all the women in Seattle who deserved to be safe, he had to find out what it was.
WHAT HAD SHE BEEN thinking, nearly telling Caleb about what she’d found in the crawl space? Obviously she was lonelier than she’d realized. He just seemed so caring, so safe, she was tempted to open up to him about her father. And Danny. Throughout her marriage and subsequent divorce, she hadn’t had anyone to talk to—not about personal matters. She couldn’t burden her mother with the sad little details of her failing marriage. Not when Annette was already overwhelmed by having her husband accused of sexual assault and murder. And because of the investigation and her focus on Brianna, Madison didn’t have any close friends.
After a good night’s sleep, she’d do better at keeping their conversations centered on inconsequential facts, she told herself. But she wasn’t sure she’d be able to fall asleep right away. Her body was still humming with the aftereffects of Caleb’s lips grazing her knuckles. Every time she closed her eyes, she imagined his mouth and hands on other parts of her body….
The telephone rang, startling her as she headed down the hall to her bedroom. She halfway hoped it was Caleb, despite wanting to keep some emotional distance between them.
When she answered, her mother’s voice came on the line. “We’re vindicated,” she said. “At last.”
Madison pulled the phone away to look down at it before bringing it back to her ear. “Did I miss something?” she asked.
“It’s true. Haven’t you heard?”
“Heard what?”
“It’s been all over the news.”
“I don’t watch the news or read the papers,” Madison said. “I’ve had enough of the press for the next ten years. So you might want to tell me what you’re so excited about.”
“The police have found another victim,” her mother said. “Another woman’s been strangled.”
Madison’s breath seemed to lodge in her throat. “You sound as though you think this is good news,” she said when she could speak again.
“It is good news, for us. Don’t you understand what it means?”
“It means another person has suffered untold depravity and violence. It means some other family has been deprived of a loved one.”
“I’m sorry for all of that,” her mother said tersely. “But I didn’t do anything to cause it. And this proves that your father wasn’t the Sandpoint Strangler, just as we’ve been saying all along.”
“How?” Madison asked.
“This victim fit the same profile the earlier ones did. She was strangled and positioned just like the others. It’s obviously the same killer.”
Her knees suddenly weak, Madison felt behind her for the couch and sank down onto it. She didn’t know what to think or how to feel. Relieved? Fearful? Doubtful? Hopeful? Somehow she seemed to be experiencing them all at once. “How do you know it’s not a copycat?” she breathed.
“Because Ellis didn’t kill those women, so there’s nothing to copy. And now that it’s happened again and he’s gone, the police will have to turn their attention to finding the real killer, and the truth will finally come out.”
“This doesn’t make sense,” Madison muttered to herself.
“What did you say?”
She swallowed hard. “Nothing. I—Where did they find her?”
“A few miles from the house.”
“Who was she?”
“A twenty-six-year-old single woman who lived near the university and worked at Nordstrom. I think her name was Susan.”
Susan. Madison closed her eyes. What if there was something in that box she’d found under the house that could’ve saved that woman? What if there was something that might help the police now? She had to take it to them, let them sort it out….
“Mom?”
“What, dear?”
“If…if I happened to stumble on something that would…that could possibly figure in the case, you’d want me to come forward with it, wouldn’t you? Even if it made Dad look as though he might really have—”
“Madison!” her mother interrupted, her voice instantly sharp.
“What?”
“I don’t think you understand what that investigation did to me, what it did to your father.”
“I do, Mom. That’s why I haven’t said anything so far.”
“Ellis was innocent! I’ll go to my grave believing that.”
“I loved him, too. I still love him. But—”
“Do you know why your father killed himself?” her mother asked, now openly weeping.
Madison thought she could come up with a few plausible reasons. She certainly knew what his critics would say. But she didn’t bother answering. Her mother’s question was rhetorical. “Why?”
“To put an end to what you and I were suffering. He hated that he couldn’t save us from the harassment we were receiving from the police, the community, even our neighbors. So he ended it.” She sniffed and gulped for the breath to continue. “He gave up his life so we could live normally again.”
“He’s gone now, Mom,” Madison said softly. “We don’t have to protect him anymore.”
“I don’t care. I won’t betray him. And no daughter of mine would betray him, either.”
Tension clawed at Madison’s stomach. Her father was gone, couldn’t have killed this latest victim. But because of that box there had to be a connection, didn’t there? “You’re not listening. I’ve found some articles that—”
“You could have a videotape and I wouldn’t believe it,” Annette cut in, her voice vehement.
Madison covered her eyes. “Faith is one thing, Mom. Sticking your head in the sand is another.”
“All I know is what my heart tells me is true,” her mother said.
Those words sounded like an echo of Madison’s conversation earlier with Caleb. But it wasn’t surprising, considering she and her mother had relied on that argument for years. “Can you always trust your heart?”
she asked, repeating his question.
“If you can’t trust your heart, what can you trust?” her mother said, and hung up.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
MADISON SHIVERED as she stood outside a few minutes later, waiting for Caleb to rouse himself from sleep and answer her knock. She tried to tell herself to go back home and go to bed. But she was too upset. Her mother would never forgive her if she turned that box over to the police.
But Madison wasn’t sure she’d be able to forgive herself if she didn’t.
It all came down to what she really believed, and she no longer knew what that was. Her father wasn’t the type to hurt anyone. But if he hadn’t murdered Lisa McDonna, why was her locket in the crawl space of his house?
Caleb opened the door wearing a pair of hastily donned jeans, judging by the top button, which was undone, and nothing else. His hair mussed from sleep, he flipped on the porch light and squinted against the sudden brightness. “Madison? Is something wrong?”
Suddenly, she felt awkward. When she was at home, it had seemed natural to come to him. She was so tired of being alone.
“I…” She fell silent because what she was feeling couldn’t be distilled into a few simple words.
“Did something happen?” he asked.
She held out her hand to reveal the coin he’d given her. That was really all she’d come for, wasn’t it? To collect on his promise that she could call him if she ever needed reassurance?
Taking her by the elbow, he guided her inside, closing the door behind them. They stood in the dim light of the living room, the shutters casting shadowed lines across Caleb’s face. “Tell me what’s wrong,” he said.
“They found another p-poor woman.” She shivered again, even though it was warm in the cottage.
Pulling her close, he put his arms around her. “You just heard?”
He seemed so solid and real, so in control at a time when she felt as if she was spinning out into space.
She closed her eyes and nodded, concentrating only on the heat flowing through her cheek, which she’d pressed to his bare chest. This was what she needed. This was all she needed. A few minutes of contact with another human being…